War of 1812

As the country prepared for yet another war with Britain, the
United States suffered from internal divisions. While the South
and West favored war, New York and New England opposed it because
it interfered with their commerce. The declaration of war had
been made with military preparations still far from complete.
There were fewer than 7,000 regular soldiers, distributed in
widely scattered posts along the coast, near the Canadian border
and in the remote interior. These soldiers were to be supported
by the undisciplined militia of the states.

Hostilities between the two countries began with an invasion of
Canada, which, if properly timed and executed, would have brought
united action against Montreal. But the entire campaign
miscarried and ended with the British occupation of Detroit. The
U.S. Navy, however, scored successes and restored confidence. In
addition, American privateers, swarming the Atlantic, captured
500 British vessels during the fall and winter months of 1812 and
1813.

The campaign of 1813 centered on Lake Erie. General William Henry
Harrison -- who would later become president -- led an army of
militia, volunteers and regulars from Kentucky with the object of
reconquering Detroit. On September 12, while he was still in
upper Ohio, news reached him that Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry
had annihilated the British fleet on Lake Erie. Harrison occupied
Detroit and pushed into Canada, defeating the fleeing British and
their Indian allies on the Thames River. The entire region now
came under American control.

Another decisive turn in the war occurred a year later when
Commodore Thomas Macdonough won a point-blank gun duel with a
British flotilla on Lake Champlain in upper New York. Deprived of
naval support, a British invasion force of 10,000 men retreated
to Canada. At about the same time, the British fleet was
harassing the Eastern seaboard with orders to "destroy and lay
waste." On the night of August 24, 1814, an expeditionary force
burst into Washington, D.C., home of the federal government, and
left it in flames. President James Madison fled to Virginia.

As the war continued, British and American negotiators each
demanded concessions from the other. The British envoys decided
to concede, however, when they learned of Macdonough's victory on
Lake Champlain. Urged by the Duke of Wellington to reach a
settlement, and faced with the depletion of the British treasury
due in large part to the heavy costs of the Napoleonic Wars, the
negotiators for Great Britain accepted the Treaty of Ghent in
December 1814. It provided for the cessation of hostilities, the
restoration of conquests and a commission to settle boundary
disputes. Unaware that a peace treaty had been signed, the two
sides continued fighting in New Orleans, Louisiana. Led by
General Andrew Jackson, the Americans scored the greatest land
victory of the war.

While the British and Americans were negotiating a settlement,
Federalist delegates selected by the legislatures of
Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont and New
Hampshire gathered in Hartford, Connecticut, in a meeting that
symbolized opposition to "Mr. Madison's war." New England had
managed to trade with the enemy throughout the conflict, and some
areas actually prospered from this commerce. Nevertheless, the
Federalists claimed that the war was ruining the economy. Some
delegates to the convention advocated secession from the Union,
but the majority agreed on a series of constitutional amendments
to limit Republican influence, including prohibiting embargoes
lasting more than 60 days and forbidding successive presidents
from the same state. By the time messengers from the Hartford
Convention reached Washington, D.C., however, they found the war
had ended. The Hartford Convention stamped the Federalists with a
stigma of disloyalty from which they never recovered.